By Mark Jones
“Processed,” at least in front of food, is a dirty word these days. Finding someone pro-processed food has proven impossible. “Fast” is similar. Put it in front of food and lots of noses turn up. I recently was introduced to processing that makes whiskey faster. In the case of whiskey, “fast” and “processed” aren’t bad.
The history of how “processed” became derogatory eludes me, as does exactly what processed means. There was a time where preservation and making food nutritionally dense were considered positive technical advances. I discovered a site ranking foods on a 0 to 10 scale of processing. The more I look at it, the more confused I became. When first confronted with a text box for entry of a food, I thought I would try for a 10 with Pringles. Completely uniform potato chips in a can surely were surely processed. Nope, dead middle of the scale at 5. Flavor on chips, even seemingly natural sound salt and vinegar, by this site’s measure, pushes up the score. I have a book describing the science that went into creation of Gatorade. Science be damned, it ranks a 10 for being a processed food, higher than the artificially sweetened electrolytes. The scores aren’t at all intuitive. I’m left uncertain of what processed means and whether it should be derogatory.
In the case of something that is already highly processed, like whiskey, more processing may be okay. All whiskey is clearly processed. The malting, mashing, and distillation are all processes. No one complains.
I am a whiskey and bourbon novice, but that’s changing thanks to a local fundraiser with a bourbon focus. The most recent event introduced me to Cleveland Whiskey and its process for duplicating whiskey aging in days rather than years. Increasing temperature and pressure bypasses long barrel aging. Barrels still are needed to call the whiskey bourbon, but stainless-steel vessels and toasted wood chunks do the heavy lifting for some of the whiskeys. Medals adorn Cleveland Whiskey bottles, proving processed whiskey can be as good, maybe better than traditional methods.
Much about bourbon is about tradition. Rules limit what can be called bourbon. Composition of at least 51% corn is one. Aged for at least two years in new, charred oak barrels is another. Pictures on the Cleveland Whiskey site show barrels in spite of using a process to avoid barrels. The barrels aren’t needed for flavor, only to match rules to be called bourbon. Barrel aging is a science all its own. The charring of the inside is a processing technology of uncertain origin. It plays a significant role in releasing flavors from the wood, the flavor in the finished whiskey.
Aging is costly. Barrels add cost, but that’s minor and they are also the source of bourbon’s distinctive flavor. The business cost is the working capital tied up during aging. The ingredients and labor are paid for long before the whiskey can be sold. Tom Lix, the founder of Cleveland Whiskey, developed a pressure-aging process to accelerate aging with pressure. He learned to make bourbon fast. There is a lot of prior art detailed in his patent. Along the way, he discovered that the process allowed flavoring with other woods, other ingredients that couldn’t be made into a barrel. Use of maple, apple, and cherry wood gives flavor profiles previously impossible to realize.
Cleveland Whiskey is innovating to make better whiskeys faster. Unlike fast food, fast whiskey can be good, even medal winning. All whiskeys are processed. Adding more processing brings benefits. At least for whiskey, processed isn’t a bad thing.
Filed Under: Commentaries • insights • Technical thinking
